Comments

A redo of this:http://youtu.be/mXfGWENaZ3wActually went back and rebuilt this from scratch, pretty much. I'd tracked the footage in AE and I re-exported the track at a different scale. New particle sim--reliit and regraded the model. Added some particle clouds for good measure. Still needs work, but, hey, this is reall pulling off a particle clone shot with something with a defined front and back.And another version of this:http://youtu.be/DyXC-u4aYwU

Great stuff! I'd say keep it coming lest I be accused of encouraging you to ignore your real work. But seriously, you have inspired me as well to the same distraction so I don't feel sorry for you at the moment. :P

So... the above was a mere 200x200x1 pixel matrix, no motion blur, no dof, and utilized a modified form of Null_Unit's setup.For THIS one.... Start from scratch. A fire layer as texture source, Hue keyframed. 600x600x3 particles, Motion Blur, DOF, Added a wraparound environment map. Left the particles in place and gimbled the camera around.... A lot of position, focus, and zoom changes--tediously keyframed to happen on downbeats, or slide in synch with filter sweeps and wooshes. 22 Hours to render.I wonder how it's going to look?I'm about to find out! :-Dhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qilltxYYzVE*EDIT: Do that again. Not with that song.

Thanks guys!Ok, so here's a lil' somethin'-somethin' I was playing with tonight. What's interesting about this, is that I used Distance Fog to generate a Depth Map for the 3D model I'm using as an environment--I got this idea from Masqutti, who tossed it out in the Community Project thread, but this is the first time I tried it. Anyway, I used Distance Fog to fake a Depth Map for the dungeon model, then applied the "Depth Map" as a luma matte to occlude the Atomic Particles.The "Entity" that emerges from the Atomic got added because, when I keyframed my camera movement, I wasn't expecting the camera to pan a little right, then left at about 10 seconds--I was trying for a simple tilt-up. Since I got some lateral rotation, I decided to justify the camera move.http://youtu.be/KruzLUB1zYQ

[quote name="Triem23" post="40316" timestamp="1394795059"]Thanks guys!Ok, so here's a lil' somethin'-somethin' I was playing with tonight. What's interesting about this, is that I used Distance Fog to generate a Depth Map for the 3D model I'm using as an environment--I got this idea from Masqutti, who tossed it out in the Community Project thread, but this is the first time I tried it. Anyway, I used Distance Fog to fake a Depth Map for the dungeon model, then applied the "Depth Map" as a luma matte to occlude the Atomic Particles.The "Entity" that emerges from the Atomic got added because, when I keyframed my camera movement, I wasn't expecting the camera to pan a little right, then left at about 10 seconds--I was trying for a simple tilt-up. Since I got some lateral rotation, I decided to justify the camera move.http://youtu.be/KruzLUB1zYQ">http://youtu.be/KruzLUB1zYQ[/quote]

How did you get that to work with the seperate 3d layers things. Shouldn't the pillars have particles going through them?

And what was the particle simulator for the fairy things I've been trying to create something like that. And could you please do a quick breakdown for your atomic particles I don't quite get some of your breakdown...

I made another copy of my 3D model, changed it's material to all white, and put that in a composite shot with a copy of the main camera. I adjusted the distance fog in this comp--using black fog and adjusting the distance settings until the pillars that should have been between the particles and camera were white, and those behind the particles were black. I embedded this into my main comp. I moved my atomic particles (and copy of camera) into it's own composite shot, then embedded this in the main comp. In the main comp, I applied a Set Matte effect to the Atomic Particles embedded comp, using the Depth Map embedded comp layer as a luma mask. Light rays were applied to the Atomic after the Luma Matte. The particles that fly away at the end are simple. Two point emmiters, 250 particles per second, speed--about 10, and particle appearance using the built-in Sparks Star texture. Add mode. Light green color. The emitters are spread apart and parented to a rotating point. Two forces are applied; gravity and turbulence. A deflector plane was lined up with the floor. The lifetime panel was used to alter particle size; 0% size at birth, 500% size at 1% of life, 100% size at 5% of life. The alpha was also graphed in the lifetime panel, fading particles to 0% alpha at about 80% of life. Sorry, I don't remember how I set my atomic particles. That was just a couple of random settings to have something there. To do on this shot:*Another Depth Pass to keep cloud particles from passing through the floor. *A "ceiling" pass to get volumetric light coming thru the ceiling.* Adjust main comp depth fog--right now, half that vast hall is fogged out. *Torches, braizers, whatever... Some additional light sources to add visual interest. *Refine camera move--I think I want to start on the other wall (across X axis) and have more horizontal sweep as the camera trucks down the Z axis.Total creation time, maybe two-three hours, including downloading the untextured model from turbosquid and slapping textures to it

This looks great! It's feels almost a bit Zelda-esque the way some of the animations in the cinematics play out. I really like the transition and organic nature of the particles from the particle simulator leaving the atomic particle layer. The movement of the camera and particles feels right. There's a bit of light interruption "shadows" on the ground as the particles leave the portal which looks really good. Could you get the particles to interact with the column as it passes by (the light from them)?

@ES. The keyframed Flicker Light helps a lot, too@OrangePekoe--there's a heckuva lot of unplanned in this shot (for starters, I intended to insert a CG building into a landscape.Ended up doing this instead). Initially, I was just going to drop the Atomic Particles in and try Masqutti's "fake z-pass with depth fog" idea, because it had been talked about, but I don't think anyone had tried it yet. I animated my camera using target settings, instead of XYZ rotation, which I hadn't tried, yet, and that pan with the second particles is a happy accident. I wasn't trying for that, and, as I said above, I added the second particles because of it. And the particle sim; I didn't really do anything to blend it with the atomic, and the corkscrew rig was from the rigging/reflections tutorial. I did parent a light to the particles, but, since several layers are 2D embedded composites, I bet I separated the light from the Background. Speaking of the background.... Why do I have the two instances of the model on seperate layers? Why didn't I stick them on the same layer, like someone who knows what he's doing. Oh, add "retexture model" to to-list.

Ok, check this out: I just had a crazy idea, here. Hitfilm's 3D model renderer doesn't yet support bump maps, but you can apply parallax to a 3D model. (try it, if you haven't. Looks terrible on anything "mechanical", but it pretty good for stone and wood.) However, applying it to a model can have weird results. But: take model texture. Convert to greyscale. Alter till I just have my desired height map, everything else to 50% grey. Apply to copy of model with diffuse/specular colors set to 50% grey. Copy camera. Model is unilluminated, but match main comp lights. Apply parallax to model. I SHOULD have a grey model with harsh highlights and shadow. Embed this in main comp, right above model layer. Set embedded comp to Overlay/Soft Light/Hard Light. Whatever looks best. Should give a bump map effect, and now I can go back to my embedded comp and grade it to reduce or increase contrast. I can mask out areas I don't want bump-mapped. Or am I crazy?

Yup parallax works great for that... for some mechanical stuff it looks not too bad. I've been playing with that for a few weeks since Stormy brought it up.Here's a few screenshots of some stuff I was working on with parallax:

@OP--- Those look fantastic!OK, so I re-did the motion of the second particle sim, got it's light working correctly in the scene, combined my models to the same layer, adjusted camera, added a second "Depth Pass." for the floor, added some spherical warp to the atomic to make it interact better iwth the second particle sime and adjust the audio mix.Still need to get better volumetric light coming through that ceiling grid, and add my other elements--braizers and more light sources, and I'm going to change the camera move again, but this is getting closer.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW2PDqBPtXIEDIT: This post refers to Revision 2 of this shot. Revision 2 has been deleted. The link above is for revision 2.

Masqutti's idea. Basically, I copied my model and made everything white. Set up a distance fog that dropped to black, and adjusted the fog until I had the correct transition. Embed the depth fog render and use as a luma matte.I have two different "Depth passes." one for the columns, masking the atomic particles and fire, the other for the floor to cut off my particle fog.Oh, Revision 3.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW2PDqBPtXIEDIT: Revsion 3 has been deleted from youtube. The posted link is revision 4.

Of course, now that I LOOK at the revision 3, I see an issue--I adjusted the "Columns" "Depth Pass" because I was getting artifacts with my Fire comp. The adjustment is now chopping off too much of the bottom of the luminous green cloud around the portal. I will have to make another Depth Pass for that layer.It seems to be a pretty good workaround, but for complex shots, it looks like one has to make multiple passes with different fog settings for different depths, then use multiple instances of Set Matte/Luma to combine them. Simon, it is a clever idea--wish it was mine. :-)

Yeah. That clipping of the floor glow isn't present in revisions 1 and 2. That's what I was referring to in my last post about adjusting the depth map for the torches and screwing up the luminous fog. So for revision four, I will fix the depth map for the torches, then create a new one for the fog.

First time trying this technique. Still working out bugs and workflow, but it's getting there.

I'm really enjoying these new techniques you're bringing to light here.Will have to take a look at these depth pass techniques as well!The latest revision I'm a little torn, I love the camera movement, however, with all the extra light reflections - lens dirt, I feel it loses a bit of the environmental reflections from the light sources or perhaps I'm just tired... my eyes are being drawn to the lens dirt. That being said, I love where this is going, once you tweak the floor plane glow it will really add to this shot. Also, this is going to be extremely helpful to the community with active camera movements and lighting based effects.

Heh. I'll do a tutorial...OK, so I redid the mask layer for the floor and toned down the grade a lot. I did have to do some rotoscoping, but, only on three torches for a combined total of nine seconds. Beats having to roto all columns, torches and arches for 20 seconds!Revision 4.http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uW2PDqBPtXI